The invention concerns single-tube panti-hoses whose waist opening is bounded by fabric surfaces which contain basic threads and elastic threads. Such tights are distinctive in that they are produced in a continuous operation on a circular knitting machine and that the two leg parts with the body part located between them form an integral tube whose stitch wales run in the longitudinal direction and whose stitch courses run in the circumferential direction. Although the invention is described hereinafter with respect to panti-hose and/or tights, it will be clear that the invention can also be used in connection with any other type of garment which calls for an elastic waist opening.
A particular problem in the production of the tights described lies in the provision of a waist opening and the arrangement there of the elastic waist band necessary for a good fit, since it is desired to prepare the tights on the knitting machine so no subsequent operations are required.
The already known attempts to provide single-tube tights with an elastic band, start from the point that the cut-out waist opening must be provided all round with an elastic band of good appearance, as is the case with tights produced in other ways. This leads to the disadvantage that the relatively expensive elastic thread material is also provided in positions where it is completely superfluous and takes no part at all in the good fit of the tights.
Therefore the problem underlying the invention is to provide tights with good fit for whose production as little elastic thread material as possible is necessary. Should it however be desired on visual grounds to use more elastic thread material than is absolutely necessary for the good fit of the tights, it is then a further aim of the invention to use this additional thread material at least in a manner which in some way, for example in visual regard, is still significant. Finally, it is also an underlying aim of the invention to provide as cheap as possible a process for the production of the said tights which can be carried out on a conventional stocking circular knitting machine.